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Regeneration of Cones in Retinas with Zebrafish

University of Alberta researcher Ted Allison has revealed an unknown fact that stem cells from zebrafish could revive damaged cones in retinas and restore eyesight to people.

Journal Public Library of Science reports that stem cells could be used to only replace the cones in its retina. It has strong implications in the field of human eyesight.

If the medical science looks back, it has worked on rods and not cones in regenerating the photoreceptor cells. Earlier the experiments were performed on the nocturnal rodents, animals that require good night vision. They have rods and cones in abundance. Rods and cones are the photoreceptors. Rods provide night vision and cones are responsible for color at daytime.

According to Allison, "This is the first time in an animal research model that stem cells have only repaired damaged cones". It would be a breakthrough for the people with injured eyesight as the daytime color vision would improve.

This discovery can increase the hope in the field of stem cell therapy. Next step according to Allison would be to recognize the particular gene in zebrafish. This would repair the damaged cones.